Review
Based on Frank Willard's 1922 play "that startled the world" (as Universal advertising put it), this original silent version of The Cat and the Canary became the standard by which all future haunted house comedy-thrillers would be measured. Beautifully restored and released on DVD in 1998, the film's enduring appeal is certainly not due to its silly reading-of-the-will melodramatics -- hoary even for 1927 -- but because of German director Paul Leni's flamboyant visual style and a wonderfully self-effacing sense of humor. Everything one expects to happen happens here, but Gilbert Warrenton's busy camera (decades ahead of its time), Charles D. Hall's impressive sets (some of which reappeared in Frankenstein four years later), and ripe acting from a well-chosen cast make The Cat and the Canary roaring good comedy-melodrama. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
Synopsis
Frank Willard's barn-storming stage melodrama Cat and the Canary was filmed four times over a fifty-year period. This silent 1927 version stars Laura LaPlante as one of several potential heirs to a huge fortune. Brought to a foreboding mansion on the 20th anniversary of their eccentric benefactor's death, the heirs must sit in silence as the lawyer (Tully Marshall) recites the terms of the will. The legacy hinges upon three sealed letters, each to be opened at a strategic point in the evening. Also crucial to the inheritance is the insistence that all the heirs spend the night in the creepy old mansion. Nervous Creighton Hale appoints himself LaPlante's protector--a far from simple job, given the many hidden panels and revolving doors which festoon the house. When the lawyer is murdered, LaPlante is the principle suspect. Cat and the Canary was remade as The Cat Creeps in 1930, and under its own title in 1939 (with Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard) and 1979. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
